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Documenti di Professioni
Documenti di Cultura
Contents
List of Illustrations ............................................................. 6
Foreword ............................................................................ 7
1. The Rudiments of Runelore ............................................ 9
2. Four Rune Poems ......................................................... 45
3. Seven Old English Runic Verses .................................. 56
4. Three Runic Finds from Brandon, Suffolk ................... 66
Illustrations
I i " I
Fig.2
Fig.3
Fig.4
Fig.5
Fig.6
Fig.7
Fig.8
Foreword
My purpose in writing this book is to provide the person coming fresh to
the subject of runes with a handy and inexpen ive reference work such
as I would have wished to have when I began studying the ancient
languages of the north, some twenty year ago.
The situation today is very different from then, however: I had to
comb the second-hand bookshops of London to find a couple of not very
reliable treatments of the subject, whereas today there are large numbers
of books about runes and more appearing every year. The usefulness of
any book is not always apparent since the subject has strayed into the
hands of occultists and professional scholars, and the interested, nonspecialist layman is likely to feel reviled by both parties! I hope to have
gone some way to redressing that situation, and to have provided "the
man on the Clapham omnibus" with as much sound and unbiased
information as he can be expected to want to make use of. A short
bibliography gives my main sources for this present work, although my
other actual sources are the many works on more or less closely related
topics I have consulted over the years and the not inconsiderable time 1
have spent trying to work out the details of the inscriptions, either at first
hand or from photographs.
The bulk of the present book comprises the text "Rudiments of
Rune lore" a much expanded version of a talk given in the winter of 1994
to a London meeting of The English Companions. The further sections
entitled "The Norfolk TIW Runes" and "The Brandon Runes" were
prepared for publication in another format until the opportunity
presented itself, at the suggestion of Tony Linsell of Anglo-Saxon Books,
to include them with other relevant material to produce a comprehensive
hut manageable book devoted to the subject. I also include the texts of
the more commonly referred to Rune Poems, with my own translations,
for ease of reference.
Foreword
1111 1 l '
Steve Pollington
Essex, January 1995
one
Ihit Ii lrn
10
f
f
I>
<
J>
th
<>
t::
ng
Figure I
11
I In
f\
< 11 'l'k
11
12
13
simplification, reducing the number of characters from 24 to 16 obviously some names were discarded with their referents. I shall point out
important differences in the meanings in these separate traditions when
relevant. The division into groups of eight (Icelandic cettir) is traditional
and plays a part in runic cryptographic systems, as we shall see.
Runic spelling is not entirely regular, lacking the discipline which
printing, word-processing and mass literacy demand. The runes were
conventionally written from left to right, but the earliest inscriptions are
commonly written from right to left as well. In fact, it is not at all unusual
for longer runic texts to be written boustrophedon, which is to say
alternately left-to-right and right-to-left. Some runemasters reversed their
letter-shapes when writing right-to-left, for example the word ' (he) swam'
which would have the form XI ~
in left-to-right format appears
thus:
(l
< 11.111111ni
' 111 h wa ' (and is) ill-suited to the writing of the Germanic dialects. The
WL'lll-. link in using this argument to account for the origins of the script is
thut the runes themselves are not drawn straight from Roman capitals or
any known form of cursive script, but seemingly from the North Italic
script in use in the Alps; looking a little further back in history, though, we
have the great northern Germanic triumphs over Rome of the Cimbri and
Teutones in the last centuries BC, whose passage included Alpine areas
where the [talic script flourished. The Cimbri have left their name in the
i land of Himmerland, off the Jutland coast. The angular i.e. 'runic' form
of writing may thus have been in use there since those times, though being
cratched into perishable materials it has not survived archaeologically,
and only the Roman impetus on the Germans towards increased use of
more permanent materials, and greater use of writing generally, has
preserved this evidence for us.
Perhaps even more interesting (for us) is the fact that the peoples of the
Jutland peninsula were dominated by a group of seven tribes whose main
distinguishing feature was (according to informed contemporary Roman
opinion) the worship of a mother goddess called Nerthus - among whom,
one group, the Anglii, were later to emigrate westwards to the ex-Roman
province of Britannia and establish a powerbase there.
rFH
1411~
Figure 2
while others
inverted them
alternately,
e.g.
the word
Figure 3
15
' brother'
111 Iii lnllm in 1 sc tion, there are certain special characters used to show
.111111d 101 which modern English spelling has no separate letters. These
11 1 lollows:
FIRST GROUP
.I
*fehu
(sound value 'f')
1)
a etc.
It hould also be noted that the asterisk(*) before the words given below
means that they are 'reconstructed', which is to say that they represent
form so ancient that they are not recorded anywhere but have been
deduced from words found in the later, recorded languages. OE means
< Id ~nglish, Ole means Old Icelandic, ON means Old Norse, West
S 1:011 i , a dialect of OE, as is Anglian.
16
*iiruz
(sound value 'u')
pr bably the word for the aurochs, a large species of primitive cattle
1gainst which Germanic youths used to test their courage and skill at
urms; it may have a transferred meaning 'manhood, vigour' on this
11 count. The horns of the beast were much-prized, and from them
d.'.'inking vessels were made by the addition of elaborate metal fittings.
1111 examples were unearthed from mounds at Sutton Hoo (only the
I11tings survived) and the Taplow barrow. The aurochs was not found in
!111gland in Anglo-Saxon times, so the retention of the word with this
.1 nsc underlines the Anglo-Saxon regard for ancient traditional lore.
I Ii Norsemen substituted a homonym meaning 'drizzle'. (OE iir, ON
Ill ' 'drizzle', Ole ur 'slag')
17
*lmrisaz
(sound value 'p')
1 kind of' large, malevolent being often translated as 'giant' although
p 1 haps ' demon ' or 'wizard' are closer to the original idea; this rune1111rn wa altered in Anglo-Saxon England to porn 'thorn' on account of
it s shape, and taken over into the bookhand to represent the sound 'th' (P,
/>) . The OE verse is skilfully worded and may still have echoes of the
original meaning, since it is possible to detect indirect references to a kind
of maleficent creature who prays on human frailties. (ON ]Jurs)
1
*ansuz
(sound value 'a')
is the word for a member of the family of the gods, whom the Norse
call the .!Esir; it may refer here especially to Wiiden, the god with
special runic links. The OE poem has replaced this with the homonym
'os' (mouth) though there is a strong possibility that there is a punning
reference to Woden, the god most closely associated with eloquence and
prophecy, in the cleverly worded verse. The English rune r:: continued in
fourth place even though a character with the same shape (f:) remained in
use with a different sound value. This suggests that the runes were
remembered mainly by their names, and that os continued to occupy the
position of its ancestor *ansuz. (OE os, ON 6ss)
*ramo
(sound value 'r')
i the act of 'riding' or where this takes place, the 'road'; the two
m dern senses have split from the original single idea of 'road' as
wherever one chooses to ride. This rune may have been used as a
j urney charm, like a modern 'St. Christopher' medallion, or to speed
the dead on the road to Hel. Many Anglo-Saxon funerary urns feature
h nv 'chevron' decoration which may reflect a group of r-runes in
s ri s. (
rad, ON reio)
18
<
*kaunaz/*kenaz
*gebo
( ound value 'y' or 'g')
*wunjo
(sound value 'w')
can be rendered 'joy' or 'pleasure' although it also has connotations of
affectionate relationships (OE wine 'friend') and mutual support (OE winnan
'fight'). With *gebo it encompasses all manner of bounty and freedom from
want, the protection of one's kindred and the pleasure of human contact. The
rune was adopted into the bookhand asp, p where it served to represent the
s und we spell with 'w'. The OE poem gives the name as wen which is a
word for 'hope' or 'expectation', but the following verse and other evidence
suggest that *wunjo is the true original. (Wen could also conceivably
r present the English form of the name of the deities whom the Norsemen
\i rshipped under the name Vanir, but there is no known evidence for their
\i orship under that name among the English.) (OE wen)
19
SECOND GROUP
*eihwaz
*hagalaz
(sound value
'x' or 'h' )
i ' huil ', which the English, Icelandic and Norse Rune Poems all refer
lo us a kind of ' grain'; it is the first of the so-called winter-runes. In the
Engli 'h tradition, this verse opens the second octet of runes and is
longer than the standard three-line set, perhaps to mark this transition.
(
hcegl, ON hagal)
*nau()iz
(sound value 'n')
means 'need, distress' (and may be a euphemism for 'death'); it is the
antithesis of the rune *wunjo. OE verse describes nyd as wyrda
heardost 'the hardest of events' and its range of meanings seems to
cover all kinds of physical privation and negative emotion. The OE
poem presents it as a kind of adversity which may act as a test of moral
fortitude. (OE nyd, ON nauor)
*isaz
*perl>-
is ' ice', a fitting partner for *hagalaz and the last winter-rune before
*jera 'spring'. In Germanic tradition, ice was the primeval solid matter
from which everything else was created or released through the action
of its opponent, fire. Here we may see a link with the power of runes to
bind or freeze, just as ice freezes and locks creation in its grasp. The OE
poem stresses the beauty and marvellous quality of ice, rather than its
harmful aspects. (OE Is, ON is)
*jera
(sound value 'j ')
i the 'year' both as the measure of time and also as the passing round
of ea ons from springtime to harvest, but excluding the winter months.
It ha trong associations with the land's fertility and with fruitful
lwrv ts. (OE ger, ON ar)
20
is far and away the most enigmatic rune, partly because its sound value
was a rarity in Germanic. The OE Rune Poem mentions something
which is a pleasure to men in the hall and various suggestions from
' dice box' or ' chessman' to 'sexual relations' have been put forward
but none has been generally accepted. An interesting speculation is that
the shape represents the primeval well of past time which periodically
overflows when an age of the world passes, at which time the worldtree shakes and cataclysmic events take place on earth - the ragnarokr
or passing of the mighty ones - as movingly described in the Icelandic
poem Voluspa. However, there is also the possibility that peorp is
merely a rhyming doublet of cweorp, the name of the later, English 'q'111ne, and that both are taken over from some Celtic original, perhaps
onnected with ceirt, the ogham name for the apple tree. (OE peor/J)
21
*algiz
i 1111.: pr sumed form for this rune which occurs in the Old English
N/1111'
f'o ,,,, in a confusing verse about a kind of sedge and in the Norse
"' ith the meaning ' bow'. However, the sound 'z' which the original
1 pr cnt was dropped in early Old English and changed to a variant of
r' (written 'R' ) in Norse, so both languages can be assumed to have
r m delled their runic traditions accordingly. The Norse name yr (bow
made of yew) is based on *eihwaz (see above) while the Anglo-Saxons
had no need of a special 'z'-rune since the early English language only
u ed the sound as a pronunciation variant (allophone) of ' s' ; the value
' x' was transferred to the character in Christian times. The original
meaning is presumed to have been 'protection, guard', a word which
gave rise to OE ealgian 'to protect' and the word ealh ' temple, sac~ed
place' (see p.75f. below). That there may also have been a connection
with the name Alcis, cited by Tacitus as applied by the Germanic folk
to a pair of divine twins, cannot be excluded either, given that their
worshippers regarded them as especially concerned with saving those in
danger, much like the Greek Dioskouroi. (OE eolhsecg, ON fr)
THIRD GROUP
*teiwaz
(sound value 't')
is the name of the principal Germanic god of the early heathen period,
before WOoenaz usurped his position (his name is equivalent to Roman
Jupiter and Greek Zeus). While not simply a war-god, the spear-symbol
which stands for his name suggests masculine associations - arms were
the mark of the freeman in early Germanic society, allowing full
participation in legal and social matters; this symbol is taken over
directly from the Bronze Age rock carvings. The English verse refers
not directly to a heathen god but to a constellation, though native
Germanic religion had an astro.logical dimension just like the Roman
and Greek. The rune may well have been used as a victory charm, and
it is found on various weapons, funerary urns and amulets with obvious
apotropaic intent. (OE tir, ON Tyr)
*berkana
(sound value 'b' or 'b')
has the literal meaning ' birch-tree' although its associations are rather
with fertility and spring rites (the birch is often the first to sprout leaves
and catkins in the northern forests). The OE poem describes a tree more
like an aspen than what we call a birch. (OE beorc, ON bjarkan)
*sowulO
(sound value 's')
means 'sun' which both English and Norse traditions reflect. It has
been proposed that OE sigel 'sun I 's'-rune' (and also swegel 'sky')
refer to a sun cult represented by the sun symbol -.5>'; there can be no
d ubt that the sun played a central role in most early European religion.
It wa sometimes conceived of as a huge radiant disk borne on a
wagg n or ship across the vault of heaven - hence the seafaring
imagery of the OE poem.(OE sigel, ON sol)
22
*ehwaz
is the horse and the rune ' s shape may represent the legs and bent back
nl the creature. The horse was a sacred animal among the German
lribes, and was used for divination and sacrifice, though the OE poem
1 fers rather to the human joy in horses and their usefulness to man .
Norse has lost this rune. (OE eoh)
23
*mannaz
(sound value 'm')
111 1111s
rsc tanza tells of man's social role and his fallibility and mortality,
which is a long way from any notion of divinity. (OE mann, ON maor)
*()agaz
(sound value 'o' or 'd')
means 'day' or 'daylight', although it has been dropped from the Norse
rune-row. With *sowulo and *jera it may refer to symbols of a suncult, which the OE verse supports with its reference to every man's
enjoyment of the sun's radiance. (OE dceg)
*ot>ila
( und value '6')
*laguz
(sound value 'l')
is 'water': either the substance or with the more specific meaning 'body
of water, lake', possibly connected with the ritual waterscapes of
Jutland where sacrifices were made to the gods. The passage of time
among the early Germanic peoples was conceived of as a stream which
would periodically overflow - see *peorl> above -and there is certainly
an ambivalent attitude to the sea and seafaring in most early Germanic
literature, commanding both affection and respect. (OE lagu, ON logr)
*inguz
is often the last of the Common Germanic runes (alth u h metimes the
last pair M and ~ are reversed), with the meaning 'inherited wealth,
homeland, farm, family estate', which apparently c mplements and
contrasts with the 'movable wealth' of the first nme. In : : , under certain
conditions, o was pronounced further forward in the 111 uth (and spelt ce)
and ultimately became identical with e, though th run c ntinued to be
used as an ideogram for the word epel 'homeland . ( "/Je/)
The Germanic runes set out above are adequate fi r the representation of
the Proto-Germanic language, which has been carefully reconstructed by
scholars working backwards from known language uch as English,
Dutch, Danish, German and so on. The y tem f c ntrasting sounds
(phonemes) worked out for the original language comprises sets of
related values as follows:
Nasals:
m, n, IJ
1, r, s, z
24
25
Liquids:
Semi-vowels:
Vowels:
y,w
short a, e, i, u
long e, i, o, ii,
re
Voicele s Continuants
Voiced Continuants
1'11- <>
t It 7 t
y,w
~""
f:Ml~fl~
r: t <
a, e, i, o, u, re
p, t, k
f, )>, x
o,a,Y
This inscription is interesting for two reason : fir tly, the text is retrograde
and the runes are reversed accordingly; secondly, me f the runes have
been deliberately cut to be read both ways, e.g. ~ r the more u ual I> 'th'.
The text reads ediwat ojil>in which rever e t form ni)>ijo tawide
''Nithijo made (this)" (Nithijo is a woman's name).
FI> H
~MX
<
r n
R
r
x
g
in
Jih
Tx
tt
M
M
m
e
H
d
T
ea
N
h
26
re
p(th)
f
J
ia
27
ng
re
<, 11111111i original , which themselves varied in shape over the period of
th i r us'. The common English innovations are:
f the Germanic a-rune f: for the sound spelt in Old English ~
(the vowel in ' cat' );
01 us
th ' u e of the Germanic 6-rune ~ for the sound spelt oe in Old English;
this sound later became e in standard West Saxon, and the rune fell
into disuse as there was already a rune for the sound ( M);
the use of the Germanic z-rune t with the value 'x' (mainly a later
development under the influence of the manuscript tradition)
certain characteristic English rune shapes, mostly extending the more
irregular characters to full height:
r ac
'oak (tree)' has the value'<!' in ngli h a the old ' a' -rune f: took
on the sound 're' due to changes in the language; the verse stanza
shows different aspects of the tree in man ' . rvice as provider of
acorns and, once built, as a ship.
Ill
i yr, the 'yew bow'; it has the sound value 'y' ('i ' pronounced
through rounded lips) and is transparently a combination of ti and I.
There is a Norse rune of the same name, based on the *algiz original.
28
is named ear and has the sound in Old English of the diphthong 'e
a'; the word ear has at least three meanings in OE. The first, 'sea',
is related to the Old Icelandic word aurr 'water' and the second,
' earth', to the Old Icelandic eyrr 'sandbank'; the third, 'ear of corn',
is connected with Old High German ahar 'spike'. Discounting this
latter meaning, the OE rune could refer either to the grave, or to a
watery death at sea. ln either case, the finality of the verse rounds
off the OE Rune Poem satisfactorily.
occurs in both English and Frisian te t with th value ' t' and is
called stiin (stone).
is the new 'o'-rune os, (the direct de cendant of *ansuz) as the old
'o'-rune ~changed its sound to 're'.
We can compare the OE rune row with the ounds actually used in the
language (standard West Saxon variety), a we did for Germanic above.
Continuants:
Stops:
Liquids:
Nasals:
Semivowels:
f po xh
pt cc
bdgg
sf z r 1
m n IJ
jw
29
hort a re e i o u y re
long
a re ei o u y re
(l>iphth ng in Old English are very complex and not easily treated in a
s11mnu11y uch as this.)
It is a curious fact that the Icelanders did more than any other nation
to preserve the indigenous traditions of the north, including knowledge
of runic practice, but Iceland has hardly a runic inscription to its name,
save the very late material from the High Middle Ages.
The Danish rune row, divided in it thre celtir, i set out below. It
should be noted that, although th number f parate runes decreased,
the sound system of the Nor e language went thr ugh a process of
development so that an increa ed range f und had t b represented
by a smaller character et. Thi trange c ntradicti n make the reading
of northern inscription unnece arily difficult and pr blematical: many
runes have to represent several sound each o that interpreting a N r e
text is a matter of fitting the possible sounds to the rune and seeing if a
word emerges! Briefly, the vowels are represented only by ' u', ' i', '9'
(an 'a' pronounced nasally) and 'a'; runes for sounds which may be
may
pronounced with or without the voice may represent either value
be 't' or 'd'). As an example take these names from Harald Bluetooth's
runic monument at Jellinge (':' represents the double-dot word separator
used in many runic texts):
Vow I :
Figure 5
The runes read hronresban which can be split into two OE words having
the standard West Saxon spelling hrones ban 'whale's bone' which is the
material from which the casket is made.
30
ct
transcription
'normalized' spelling
English
haraltr: kunukR
kurmfal>ur
l>aurui : mul>ur :
nuruiak
tanmaurk
Haraldr konungr
GormfajJur
Porve mojJur
Norveg
Danmark
f1
t>
f:
It
31
Some idea of the difficulties faced by the runologist can be gained from an
examination of this text, first as transliterated from the stone, then in
expected Old Icelandic form:
r::
t>
p
r1
In the light of the multiple readings possible with the reduced system, the
inadequacy of the sixteen rune sequence for normal communication
purposes was soon evident, and the Norsemen consequently introduced
the addition of a dot to the stem of the more ambiguous characters:
g
1
g, IJ
Figure 6
33
34
35
ritual or cult words and signs we find recorded in runes at all periods.
Viewed in this light, the eightfold repetition of 'a' becomes
comprehensible - all runic practice seems to favour the numbers three and
eight (there are 3 x 8 = 24 runes, for a start) and the ' a' rune f: stands for
the word '*ansuz', the generic name for any of the gods of the north. An
eightfold invocation of the Germanic gods could be a powerful ritual tool.
The thrice repeated ' z' rune t stands for '*algiz' meaning ' defence,
protection', another word with obvious apotropaic qualities, while the
triple 'n' i stands for '*nau()iz' or ' need '; overall the intention seems to
be an invocation of the divine powers for protection against dire straits.
The significance of ' bmu' is unclear to me (' birch-tree' I ' human being' I
' aurochs' ) but the threefold 't' rune clearly marks an appeal to the god
Tiwaz whose name is that of the rune. Finally, alu is a recognized
protective formula of very frequent occurrence on runic objects.
Pausing here for a moment, it is worth noting that 'alu' is an unusual
and powerful word - I have suggested elsewhere (see below, pp.75f.) a
link with the rune '*algiz' meaning ' protection' and also, more distantly,
with the word ' ale' (the drink) and ultimately with that ' otherness'
experienced under the effect of ale, the ' hallucination', which is also
related to the ancient root of these words. But 'alu' was not an everyday
word, as far as we can tell, and its use here may go back to very ancient
and long-lived practice. I have detected it on an early cremation urn found
here in England, and dating from the fifth century AD. A sceptic might
argue that a Germanic formula like 'alu' wouldn 't mean anything to an
Anglian settler in Britain because the Anglian (i.e. English) language had
changed quite a lot between the time of these very early inscriptions and
the Anglian migration. This is actually not a weakness but rather a strength
of my argument, since amulets - if they are to inspire confidence - should
be associated with things which are removed from the world of everyday
experience. It makes them special, gives them religious or magical power,
and sets them apart. Anyone who doubts this attraction of ritual, traditional
and archaic language should look at current attitudes to sacred texts
whereby Roman Catholics retain their holy writings in Latin and Jew~
theirs in Hebrew; even many reformist Protestant sects prefer the King
James Authorized Version of the Bible, which hardly reflects current
linguistic usage. Furthermore, if an amulet is charged with the power of its
36
37
runic inscription, then it becomes a tool for making things happen (if you
want them to) or stopping them from happening (if you don't) - both ideas
associated with Wooenaz in his role as a personification of ' wish', later
called by the Norsemen Viii or ' Will' and considered to be a brother (or
hypostasis) of Ooinn.
the more frightening aspects of the god Woden I 6oinn was his power to
' bind ' his foes with what the Norse called the herfjottur or 'army-fetter', a
kind of desperate mental paralysis which could overcome even the mightiest
in the thick of battle and render them unable either to defend themselves or
even run away. (The prime meaning of the word *ansuz ' Germanic god ' is
possibly ' binder', according to some experts.) If this binding power could
be harnessed by mortal magicians, then the prudent warrior would have
amulets to protect himself from it, the " loosening runes" which Imma' s
captors believed him to have concealed about him.
How did the ancients use the script, then? This is a difficult question to
answer, partly because we have no reliable outside eye-witness accounts of
Germanic runemasters in action, and partly because what we deduce from
the existing texts and descriptions is very much coloured by what we want
to find there - the example of ' ekunwooz' above is a case in point. Tacitus,
the Roman writer of the 1st century AD, describes the Germanic practice
of consulting the omens, by scratching signs on twigs cut from a fruitbearing tree and throwing them onto a white cloth, whence the officiant
took three at random and drew his conclusions from the signs chosen. Now
the text does not say that the signs used were runes, but it doesn 't say they
weren ' t either; therefore, those who wish to see runic sortilege in this
passage are free to do so, citing as supporting evidence the previously
mentioned wuldortanas ' glory-twigs' with which Woden the runewielding god strikes in the Nine Herbs Charm.
To get a glimpse of runes in their natural habitat we have to wait a few
centuries and move west a few hundred miles, to Britain in the time of Bede
(i.e. the late 600s and early 700s). Bede tells the story of an Anglian
nobleman called Imma who rode to war and had the misfortune to be
captured by the enemy, who decided to sell him as a slave. Meanwhile,
Imma' s kinsman, a clergyman, believed him dead and began praying for his
soul. Held bound awaiting transport to the slave-markets of London, Imma
amazed his captors when his bonds fell from him - which Bede the devout
Christian ascribed to the power of the prayers being said in his name. His
captors, ignorant heathens that they were (implies Bede), wondered greatly
at this and asked him if he knew loosening spells and had the runes written
down about him. This episode is interesting in two ways: (I) because it
shows that belief in the power of runes was credible behaviour, at least for
heathens; and (2) because it links runes with the power to unbind. One of
38
Old English literature has more to say about runes, though sometimes
the most revealing aspects are the most casual. Vocabulary is one area
where the language occasionally drops its guard and shows runes in their
natural state. Consider the following:
geriina
riincofa
riincrreftig
riinere
riinian
riinlic
riinstref
riinwita
literal translation
normal translation
with - rune-r
rune-chest
rune-skilled
rune-r
to rune
rune-like
rune-staff
rune-knower
counsellor, confidant
chamber of secrets, innermost thoughts
skilled in mysteries, the occult
whisperer, tale-bearer
to whisper, murmur, tell secrets
mystical, occult
runic character
counsellor, adviser
This last seems to me to be one of the most telling items - a ' rune-knower'
is a counsellor or adviser, suggesting that possibly every chieftain had
amongst his ministers an appointed official whose business it was to ' know
runes', to be able to use and interpret them. Similarly, the first word, ' one
who exchanges runes' suggests either a sinister co-conspirator in some
secret or, perhaps more optimistically, a kind of secretary sending statesecret messages, although whether by runic characters or by whispered
instruction to the messenger is unclear. The poem Beowulf shows us the
Danish champion Unferp, the king' s favourite who has been overshadowed
by Beowulf and wants to cut him down to size with hostile speech; the poet
says that he beaduriin onband ' unbound a battle-rune' i.e. began to act in a
39
The Norsemen also knew various types of rune which could act as a
charm and bring luck or ward off evil. In the Havamal (Words of the High
One) the god 6oinn, enumerating his many skills, says:
Pat kann ek it t6lpta A twelfth one (spell) I know
Ef ek se a tre uppi [f I see upon a tree
vafa virgilna . a corpse dangling
sva ek rist ok i ritnom fak so I cut and colour in runes
at sci gengr gumi so that that man walks
ok mcelir vio mik and talks with me.
What kind of runes these were he doesn 't say, but other texts refer to
victory-runes, ale-runes, birth-runes, surf-runes, health-runes, speechrunes, thought-runes, fertility-runes, love-runes, battle-runes, and
weather-runes. Truly, all human life is here, and there were seemingly
runes for every occasion. The 'ale-runes' may actually be the inscription
' alu' discussed earlier, while the ' victory-runes' could contain the rune
'tiw' named for the god of warfare. The efficacy of the charm was
increased (or the latent power unleashed?) by 'colouring' the runes with
blood - the spell above says i runomfak 'I colour in runes ' where ' colour'
may refer to the god' s blood or that of a sacrifice. Traces of bright pigment
have been found on Scandinavian runestones, including the small
40
As a kind of postscript to the heathen Germanic runic lore, there are the
manuscript runes of the later period, merging into the High Middle Age_s.
When the English came to record their own speech, they adapted the Lattn
alphabet to their needs but found it wanting in that there were s?unds_ in
English for which no Latin character was available. Afte_r expen~entmg
with combinations of letters, someone somewhere had the idea of us mg the
runic form corresponding to the sounds to be represented. The main
problems were with the dental fricatives ('th ' as in 'these' and 'thesis'),
which were thus written with the thorn rune I> modified for the bookhand
as jJ; similarly, the wen rune I"' was used for 'w' . (lncidentally, with the
introduction of printing, the thorn character was remodelled as a 'y' so that
the word ' the' (]le) appeared to be spelt 'ye' - hence such eccentricities as
'ye olde tea shoppe'.) Not content with this, Anglo-Saxon scribes
occasionally used runes to stand for words, as in Waldere where ealdne ~
' ancient homeland' is written with the ejJel rune acting as an ideogram.
In the Middle Ages, elaborate seriffed runes were used in manuscripts
in England, Germany and Iceland with forms such as:
Many of the riddles in the Exeter Book have runic clues embedded in their
texts, e.g. number 19
lC
on ppe reah
where the runes spell in reverse the word hors ' a horse' . Indeed, the
English Rune Poem has a decidedly riddling quality in some ve~ses, for
example where ac is described as both the living tree and the ship made
from the wood of that tree.
41
~ M 11~p~NR~11' MMH~ ~
Mt FR Mf41 DNMIP1t~tltf>
~M1'/3t f Mf1NhHhlPRI H
11RJ r~ ltl1t~f4rhRIN 14
RVIiilsKnm ~nMm
R~~n7TIMhnT1HRM
nn~IWrfrIJ
Figure 8
42
Two particular aspects of runic practice worth mentioning are bind runes
and the various cryptographic systems used in both England and
Scandinavia. Bind runes are groups of characters written in such a way
that they form a single sign: examples of such would be the group 'dd'
on an English grave stone, written as t>+<!, the combination 'ga'X' on
some early Scandinavian finds and the character
'on' from a
Greenland Viking inscription. (see page 32, fig.6) One Frisian example
is of a doubled 'st'-rune with the form CJ. Some of the specifically
English rune shapes are formed in this way: due to linguistic changes,
many of the vowels of Old English were pronounced higher and further
forward in the mouth due to the influence of the sound i and the runes
themselves re-modelled as shown above.
Two
45
47
t:
r
~
49
51
11
(feu) forman
ti
(ur) after
P"
It
(wealth) first
(aurochs) after
(giant) the third stave
(god) is over it
write (riding) at the end
'
..t
(yr) al bihabet
f (man)
'
(ur) er af illujarne;
opt leypr rreinn a hjarne
(bjarkan) er laufgr00nstr
lima; Loki bar flreroa tima
52
53
54
55
three
r.r.
56
rh
57
58
59
Lines 91 - 107
And se oe wile geornlice oone godes cwide
singan soolice and hine siemle wile
60
.r
61
Lines 124 - 42
Swilce hiene .J.Q. and .tl.V. cwealme gehnregeo
frome folctogan farao him togegnes
habbao leoht speru lange sceaftas
swiOmode sweopan swenga ne wymao
deorra dynta him bio oret deofol lao.
Donne hine I and J.L. and se yrra. k.C.
guoe begyrdao geap stref wigeo
biterne brogan bigao sona
helle hreftling oret he on hinder greo.
Donne hiene .f=.F. and .N.M. utan ymboringao
scyldigne sceaoan habbao scearp speru
atole earhfare reled lretao
on ores reondes feax tlana stregdan
biteme brogan banan heardllce
grim me ongieldao ores hie oft gi Ip brecao.
Donne hine ret niehstan nearwe stilleo
.G. se geapa oone god sendeo
freondum on fultum frereo refter .H.D.
fifmregnum full .....
Thus Q and V make him bow down in death,
the effective folk-leaders travel together,
they have light spears, long shafts
to strike severely - they do not withhold blows
- with harmful strokes; the devil is hateful to them.
Then I and L and the angry C
gird themselves for war - the tall letter fights
with bitter fear - soon abases
hell's captive so that he goes behind.
.+
62
63
biblical story here. Quite the contrary view is taken by those who read
the runes (also supplying the missing vowel) as hland 'urine' something which goes quickly on its way and also explains the
woman sitting alone!
' hawk' less certainly that ThE stands for pegn 'thane, officer' (or peow
' ervant' ), FIE for fa/ca 'falcon(?)', Ea for ear 'sea' (or eard 'land'), and
P for spere 'spear' (or spearhafuc ' sparrowhawk').
Clearly one could concatenate these runes with possible OE words
which might fit the context more-or-less well almost indefinitely.
There is no possibility of certainty in the various interpretations
advanced so far.
H l t N
le ane geseah idese sittan
65
four
II. The Antler bears a longer text which unfortunately does not mark
word divisions and has apparently been worn away at its further end. The
runes run
)
which may be transcribed thus:
W (?) H
S W IL
D (l?)(f ?)(?)
(?)
(?)
67
(adjective) or '(a) wild (thing)' (noun). The use of the dative here is
m re strictly 'locative', stating the place at which something happened.
On a piece of antler, wild should refer most readily to the animal from
which the object was taken. It is a great pity that the rest of the text is not
clear enough to allow a certain reading, although the next word evidently
begins with H 'd', and there is a prima facia case for this word having
been a form of the word deor (beast, animal), presumably the dative
singular (West Saxon deore). The apparent two 'i' runes after the 'd'
rune may then be better interpreted as the uprights of the 'e' rune M, and
the previously mentioned rune consisting of an upright and a bow could
equally be~ the 'r' rune. The text would then read:
wohs . wildum. d(eore)
[(this) grew on (a) wild beast!]
IE
(S?) (J?)
13
14
15
16
17
U Th 0
R C (G?)W
N (I?) (J?)
10 11
12
(*
68
69
cramasax; this shape is also found on the seventh century Chessel Down
hilt plate and on the wooden coffin in the tomb of St. Cuthbert. It may be
a specifically English form of ~ (> h>
although the presumptive late
date of this pin makes influence from the manuscript letter 'r' quite
likely also.
The following rune is puzzling since it immediately appears to be a
very early (Continental Germanic) form of the rune *jera. One would
expect the 't' rune t here and it might be proposed that the staff of the
rune has been worn away leaving only the 'head' were it not for the fact
that it would be an unbelievable coincidence that a mirror-image of this
residual shape shou ld remain from the presumed next rune~ 'b'. It is far
more likely that we are here dealing with a late or regional runic tradition
in which some confusion of shapes and sequence has occurred. The
remainder of the inscription is now illegible.
The pin is pierced on one side, suggesting that it may have been one of
a pair or set of three, like those found in the River Witham. I would like
very much to know what was written on its sister-pieces - perhaps an
ownership fonnula recording the name of the woman whose dress or
headrail it held fast? The surface of the present piece does not appear large
enough to accommodate thirty or more runes - in fact there are only twelve
in the top line so perhaps twenty-four was the figure to be catered for, the
same number as in the Common Germanic rune-row. The curious mixture
of apparently early fonns (e.g. ~ ), late fonns (e.g.
and oddities (e.g.
f) suggests that here in East Anglia an individual and largely independent
runic tradition was developing by the 900s.
As the Brandon pin is one of just two English .fuporcs (outside
manuscript sources) its importance cannot be overstated, even though it is
far from complete. However the divergence between some of its runeshapes and those found elsewhere only serves to underline the relative lack
of interpretable English runic finds we have, and the wealth of local
traditions which must once have existed. It is to be hoped that further such
finds at new or known sites will enable us to establish a better regional
map and typological sequence for our English runic inscriptions.
r)
+' r)
70
five
The Norfolk
'Tiw' Runes
A re-interpretation.
(There have been many references in books on rune , Anglo- axon religion, and so on,
to the TIW runes from the pong Hill cemetery (above). The English Heritage Guide to
Anglo-Saxon England published the drawing from which the interpretation was
formulated.)
71
Another recent reference to this runic text is in David Wilson's Angloaxon Paganism, where the author points out the unique character of the
runic stamp which consists of three characters in relief; of the three, the
first consists of a T-rune with two pairs of arms, the second a similar form
but with only one pair of arms and the third either a bind-rune ofl and U or
the (separate) y-rune. The interpretation given in this book is of a double
rendering of the god's name, whereby the first rune represents the god's
initial and the remainder spell the god's name in full i.e. TIU or TY.
What surprised me, turning to the illustration, is that the stamp "bearing
the name of the warrior god Tiw" shown in both books actually does not
show what one would expect to find as the runic spelling of Tiw's name,
i.e.t I f". The illustration, reproduced above, is taken from the excavation
report of the Spong Hill cemetery, and is a good example of a tentative,
interim interpretation by an expert in a quite different discipline passing
into the ' folklore' of the subject without further investigation (or,
seemingly, discussion). The Spong Hill TIW runes are referred to in more
than one other book on northern religion and burial practice. I am not sure
who suggested that the text in question might read TlW, but it is clear that
this interpretation relies largely on the identification of the middle rune
with that which customarily stands for the god's name.
Now the text does have as its middle character the spear-shaped rune t
which is sometimes used to stand for the whole name Tiw, in just the same
way as the scribe of the Beowulf manuscript once wrote the 'm' rune
(called monn, t1) to stand for the word monn ('man, person') in the poem.
This use of runes as syllabic symbols, which was particularly associated
with the riddling poet Cynewulf, was a convenience when the rune symbol
could be substituted for the entire word which was its name. The 't' rune t
does sometimes appear on English and Continental weapons with
presumably devotional intent, the war god's power and protection being
invoked through the marking of his name by means of the sign which was
itself named after him; the Old English Rune Poem clearly refers to Tiw
although the manuscript reads fir 'glory'.
But the rune Tiw is only one of the three present, and what is more
the others are not of regular form. Taking the last (fl first, this looks
rather like the earliest forms of the Yr rune whose classic shape is shown
as ff\ , but which betrays its origin through earlier shapes: the phonetic
72
73
Returning to the Spong Hill inscription, the first sign is clearly of the
rder 2:2 and the second I: 1. These should indicate the runic characters for
' b' and 'f respectively. Even allowing for the vowels perhaps not being
recorded, this was not a promising start. It might be that the vowels were
shown by means of a further cryptic device, namely that of representing
them by the following rune in the sequence, a practice known and used
in later Anglo-Saxon England. The inscription would then read f: 'a/re'
and M 'e' (using the alphabet) or M 'e' and t1 'u' (using thefaj:Jorc), again
improbable as the beginning of an English word even at so early a date. A
more fundamental problem was the third character rT\ however, which
exhibits a rather different shape from the other two; it was clearly meant to
be distinct from the sign next to it, but what significance should be
attached to the 'branches' reaching down to the base line? This is not a
normal feature of the twig-rune system of cryptography, and tended to
suggest that another solution to the problem would have to be sought. But
what else could these three runes signify? With so little to go on, the
problem seemed insoluble.
The answer to the question just posed, when it came to me, had been
staring me in the face all along. As often happens, it was necessary to
take a step back from the analytical approach I had been following and
look again with fresh eyes at the inscription. What I should have seen
straight away, before considering the possible phonetic or
ideogrammatic content of the text, was its morphology, its shape. What
was so striking about the characters before me was that each of them
was symmetrical, which few runes are. Could this be chance? Or was
there something significant here I had just overlooked? Sure enough, if
you bisect each character along its vertical axis (its plane of symmetry)
you see a very different text for the stamp now reads f: t t1 'alu' ;
moreover, it reads this both forwards and backwards :
74
alu+ula
What does this mean? Now 'alu' is not a common Old English word,
though it could be an early or dialectal form of the word ' ale ' - West
Saxon ealu or ealoo. So was the man in the urn a brewer? A heavy
drinker? A licensed victualler? Or could 'Alu' have been his personal
name? In fact as a short formula, ' alu' is what the Anglo- axons called a
galdorword, a charm or spoken formula. It is presumed to have been in
use for some considerable time, since it is found in the elder faj:Jark or
Common Germanic rune row (see below). At the early date of the Spong
Hill cemetery (C.5- 6) it is uncertain whether the fir t rune would have
had its original value ' a' or its Old English value ' re , but since the word
is always spelt with these same three runes it matter little whether we
transcribe the earlier 'alu ' or the Poto-Old ngli h 'adu '. In fact, the die
used to impress the Spong Hill pot must have been of traditional design
dating from the earlier runic period - if indeed the stamp itself was not
handed down among potters for generati n and thus of great antiquity
already before it came to England.
According to R. W. V. Elliott, the word ' alu' (which also occurs on
the 3rd century Lindholm amulet and el ewhere) is a ' magic' word of
which the meaning is 'protection, taboo ' . The similarity of this word to
*alul> the reconstructed proto-Norse word for ' ale ' caused confusion in
later centuries when ' ale-runes ' (9lrunar) were interpreted as suitable for
inscribing on a drinking horn in order to ensure the wholesomeness of
the contents. An incident in Egils Saga Skallagrimssonar has the herorunemaster Egil carve ale-runes on his drinking vessel, redden them with
his blood and sing a charm over them, whereupon the horn bursts
asunder due to the fact that the drink had been laced with poison. Here
the nature of the protection afforded by the runes has been re-interpreted
and the apotropaic power of the formula ' alu' has become a much more
prosaic litmus test for toxins.
75
healing food and drink; yet ' ale ' does not fit all the occurrences of
' alu ' where something more akin to ' beware! ' seems to be involved
(vi) a trio of rune names *ansuz *laguz *uruz ' god - water - strength '
with perhaps mythical associations; thi also fails to take account of
the fact that ' alu ' is a word not a cipher.
76
77
Conant himself suggests that alu = allu neuter plural of Old Nor e allr
all and means ' all the gods' (which are traditionally neuter in gender in
northern mythology). While not without merit thi al o eem to fail to
capture the apotropaic function of the charm.
As a means of averting bad luck or the effi ct f vil magic alu
may have had religious or magical significance. nfortunately rune
magic is so tainted by mediaeval tradition and id a that it i perhaps
unsafe to make any assumptions about what th charm-word alu might
have meant to the inhabitants of fifth c ntury N rfolk. It is however
worth speculating that the word itself i deri ed from the same
Germanic or pre-Germanic (Proto-Ind - ur pean) root as the runename *algiz which also appears to mean protection ' . (If the word
were Primitive Old English ' alu, C1u ' c uld represent a Germanic
noun form *aluz, but this would app ar a *aluR in Old Norse, a form
which simply does not occur.) Therefi r regarding alu as a noun of the
common type seems quite unprofitable. It i perhaps possible to see it
as the first person singular pre ent indicative of a verb, meaning
something like '1 protect' or I avert (e ii) which form could end in u. Even in the much later manu cript of Beowulf we find such a form
as hafa for ' I have', retaining the -u ending for the first person singular
(line 2523 ... ic me on hafu... ). On an amulet this meaning has a
particular aptness since it both empha i es the protective power of the
object and also renders it ' animate in the sense that the amulet itself
declares its own power.
Alternatively there is a Proto-Inda-European root *alu which relates
to sorcery, magic and intoxication, and which lies behind the words ' ale'
and ' hallucination ' (via Latin from Greek). Another, extended form of
this root is *alek with a meaning ' ward off, protect giving rise to Greek
aleks (strength), aleksein (to protect); and this *alek may also give rise
to the Germanic word *algiz (the z-rune' s presumed name) with very
similar meaning. If the ' alu ' charm and the z-nme called *algiz are
related, then it may not be overstating the case to suggest that there was
me association of ideas in these words. The mere fact that both have a
I o e connection with protection may mean that their root lies in the PIE
root *al- (beyond) - this root gives rise to a great many English words,
notably ' alter', ' adultery', ' ultimate' etc. from Latin, and the more
homely Germanic reflexes else, elsewhere' - with a meaning ' I put
(evil) elsewhere, l avert (evil)'. (Against this hypothesis is the fact that
the ending -u is confined to strong verbs, but the root al- cannot belong
to this verbal type due to its vowel and root structure.)
Arriving at a substantially similar conclusion by a different route, the
noted runologist Professor Elmer H. Antonsen identifies alu with Old
English ealoo, Old Saxon alo, etc. all meaning ' beer, ale ' and equates
' ale-runes' with ' magic-runes' in that they were perhaps thought to cause
delusion and mental excitement, citing parallel Indo-European
derivatives such as Greek a/uein ' be besides one' s self , Lithuanian
ali6tis ' rage, act foolishly ', and Hittite alwanzatar ' magic' (see above).
It is quite likely that the two ideas, ' magic, sorcery' and ' aversion,
protection ', became merged in the popular mind and a simple verb
meaning ' deflect, tum aside, ward off came to have powerful apotropaic
associations which remained into the period of runic development
(variously ascribed to the centuries immediately before or after Christ)
and gave rise to the concise but evidently time-honoured galdorword
alu. That this Germanic formula should turn up in fifth century Norfolk
should not really surprise us, for the English were then but newly arrived
in this island and had not yet learnt to despise their long-standing
cu toms. Whether anyone knew at Spong Hill what the pot-stamp meant
is of course another matter although the presence of runes suggests a
rune-master, or at the very least a certain familiarity among those
responsible for organising the deceased ' s affairs with a tradition of runic
stamps and dies. By the time the Spong Hill stamp was in use there the
meaning might well have been forgotten - especially as the shapes used
were not the familiar Anglo-Saxon ones - and its continued use may owe
more to family tradition and a feeling of awe attached to some ancient
device - a true amulet.
In the aforegoing I hope I have shown that despite having been
accepted by Anglo-Saxonists as a dedication to Tiw for more than fifteen
years (e.g. L. & J. Laing Anglo-Saxon England, l 979, page 87) the
Spong Hill inscription must be seen as an encrypted or mystically
repeated example of the Common Germanic alu formula. How many
other disregarded English runic texts await a fresh eye and re-appraisal, I
wonder?
78
79
Six
at all. The difference between what I understand as a ' rune' and what is
meant by the term in some books is that I restrict its use to any of the
characters used in recording the North and North West Germanic
languages and their descendants, whereas a more general definition seems
to apply elsewhere e.g. ' angular mark used at some time in Europe' . The
problem with this is self-evident: if you throw down a handful of sticks at
random, the chances are that some of them will fall touching each other,
and that many of the arrangements so produced will have been used
somewhere, at some time as a runic character. It therefore follows that
mediaeval masons' marks or guild marks, even the cattle-brands used by
American ranchers and the like, which are also often predominantly
rectilinear and angular, will often resemble rune . To argue from this for a
secret society practising runic magic from Neolithic times into the Middle
Ages is misleading and dangerous, and the evidence for it tenuous though it is not entirely impossible, of cour e.
The later history of runes - tracing them into modem times - is rather a
different subject, touching on Scandinavian and Icelandic folklore
traditions and the ' folksy ' arts and crafts movements of the last century.
An interesting postscript to mainstream runic studies is in the use of
runic - or at least runelike- symbols by the German armed forces during
the Second World War. The so-called Odal rune (~) was the divisional
insignia of the 14th Panzer Division, while the 19th used a symbol based on
the re-rune, the so-called woljsangel 'wolfs hook '
which with
variations was also used by Sturmgeschutz Brigade 249, the 2nd SS Panzer
Division, Panzergrenadier Division Feldherrenhalle and 4th SS-Polizei
Panzergrenadier Division. Naturally, the military elite chose to represent
its name (Schutzstaffel) by means of the two initial s-runes: ~ ~ . Closer
to home, the party symbol or logo of the Scottish Nationalists is the ejJel
rune~ inverted: since epel is 'homeland ' this is presumably no accident,
although it might represent a thistle.
+,
81
Appendix 1
Analysis of the Distinctive Featuresofthe Elder Futhark
A staff is a basic upright; a branch i a single traight line leading upwards off a tafT; an arm is
a single straight line leading downward off a taff; a crook i a rightangled tum; a pocket is an
enclosed area; a altire is an x- haped cro s. (I and r mean lefi and right side respectively).
- -~- -
_J)__
----
branch
arm
-
-~---~-----
~OF.. - - -
- -~- - -~- -
_ _)( _
__ ,._ _
-----r-
----------.
I middle
I top: ___
I middle r
t_________ _
--------
l .---------
___________ -------~~-~[~~-~~~~~~~
saltire
I middler ~
------I middle I
~---------
-r----------
I top r
----------- ~----------
--------
--l---------~
I t pI
I boll n1 r
:
:
----------- -
----------- ~----------
I: :__
I top r
I bottom r
-~~~~~]~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~ --~~~~:~~-- ~~~~~~~~~~~[~~~~~~~~~~
i
i
I
I top I
b b
_J:t_ _
__rt_
__t_ _
0
- - - -- - - - - - - - - - -- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
.L .---------
i
I top r i
-------.- ---------- ----------- ----------- -t!>5>_t!:.~1!1-~ -~ ---------l
--2~ -
82
---------
- - - - - - -:- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - _I_
__1._ __L_
crook
2middler
_J~_ -
<
staff j
----------- -----------
---------
-----------~----------
-r---------------------------------1----ri 1~
83
I middle
bo~~~
Bibliography
Bibliography
The following works were consulted in the preparation of this book, although
they reflect only a small portion of the scope of runic studies today.
Teutonic Magic
Gundarsson, K veldulf
Halsall, Maureen
A ltenglisches Etymologisches
Worterbuch
Holthausen, F.
Antonsen, Elmer H.
Antonsen, Elmer H.
Anglo-Saxon Runes
Kemble, J. M.
(ed. Griffiths, B.)
Antonsen, Elmer H.
Anglo-Saxon Pottery
Kennett, David H.
hire Publications,
Ayle bury, 1989
Anglo-Saxon England
Laing, L. & J.
Lass, R.
Historical Linguistics: An
Introduction
Lehmann, Winfred, P.
Myres, J. N. L.
Page, R. l.
Page, R. I.
in Archaeologia, 1967
Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts
Brown, Michelle P.
Campbell, A.
Chambers, R. W.
Conant, Jonathan B.
Ebbinghaus, E. A.
Runes: An Introduction
Elliott, R. W. V.
Elliott, R. W. V.
in Speculum, 1957
Garmonsway, G. N.
An Introduction to English
Runes
Gordon, E. V.
84
85
Bibliography
Polome, Edgar C.
Journal oflndo-European
Studies Monograph,
Washington, 1989
Rodrigues, Louis J.
Rodrigues, Louis J.
Handbook of Old-Northern
Runic Monuments of
Scandinavia & England
Stephens, George
Tacitus (trans.
Mattingly, H. revised
Handford, S.A.)
Penguin Books,
Harmondsworth, 1976
Taylor, Marvin
Thomas, Charles
Watkins, C.
in American Heritage
Dictionary, Houghter Mifflin
Co., 1985
2CDs
This CD contains lessons and texts from First Steps in Old English.
Tracks include: 1. Deor. 2. Beowulf- The Funeral of Scyld See ling. 3. Engla Tocyme (The
Arrival of the English). 4. Ines Domas. Two Extracts from the Laws of King lne. 5. Deniga
Hergung (The Danes' Harrying) Anglo-Saxon Chronicle Entry AD997. 6. Durham 7. The
Ordeal (Be oon 0e ordales weddigap) 8. Wio Dweorh (Against a Dwarf) 9. Wio Wennum
(Against Wens) 10. Wio Wreterrelfadle (Against Waterelf ickness) l l. The Nine Herbs
Charm 12. Lrecedomas (Leechdoms) 13. BeowulPs Greeting 14. The Battle ofBrunanburh
There is a Guide to Pronunciation and sixteen Reading Exercises
15 2CDs - Free Old English transcript from www.asbooks.co.uk.
Anglo-Saxon England
Welch, M.
A Feast of Creatures
Williamson, C.
Anglo-Saxon Paganism
Wilson, D.
Wordcrafl provides Old English equivalents to the commoner modem words in both
dictionary and thesaurus fonnats. The Thesaurus presents vocabulary relevant to a wide range
of individual topics in alphabetical lists, thus making it easily accessible to those with specific
areas of interest. Each thematic listing is encoded for cross-reference from the Dictionary.
The two sections will be of invaluable assistance to students of the language, as well as those
with either a general or a specific interest in the Anglo-Saxon period.
86
9.95
The Mead-Hall
The feasting tradition in Anglo-Saxon England
Stephen Pollington
This new study takes a broad look at the subject of halls and feasting in Anglo-Saxon
England. The idea of the communal meal was very important among nobles and yeomen,
warriors, farmers churchmen and laity. One of the aims of the book is to show that there was
not just one 'feast' but two main types: the informal social occasion gebeorscipe and the
formal, ritual gathering symbel.
Using the evidence of Old English texts - mainly the epic Beowulf and the Anglo-Saxon
Chronicles, Stephen Pollington shows that the idea of feasting remained central to early
English social traditions long after the physical reality had declined in importance.
The words of the poets and saga-writers are supported by a wealth of archaeological data dealing
with halls, settlement layouts and magnificent feasting gear found in many early Anglo-Saxon
graves.
Three appendices cover:
These easy to follow recipes will enable you to enjoy a mix of ingredients and flavours that
were widely known in Anglo-Saxon England but are rarely experienced today. ln addition to
the 46 recipes, there is background information about households and cooking techniques.
5 .95
The readings of this book take the form of passages of translation from some Old English
poems. The author paraphrases their content and di cuses their place and significance in the
history of poetic art in Old English society and culture.
The author's knowledge enthusiasm and love of his subject help make this an excellent
introduction to the subject for students and the general reader.
9.95 hardback 240 pages
This work examines the largely untold story of English sea power during the period 871 to
1100. lt was an age when English kings deployed warships first again t Scandinavian invaders
and later in support of Continental allies.
The author has gathered together information about the appearance of warships and how they
were financed, crewed, and deployed.
14.95 hardback
Rudiments of Runelore
Organisations
Stephen Pollington
The pu-'.Pose of this boo~ is to provide both a comprehensive introduction for those coming to
the subject for the first time, and a handy and inexpensive reference work for those with some
knowle?ge of the subject.. The Abecedarium Nordmannicum and the English, Norwegian and
Icelandic rune poems are included as are two rune riddles, extracts from the Cynewulf poems
and new work on the three Brandon runic inscriptions and the Norfolk 'Tiw' runes.
Include: The Origin of the Runes; Runes among the Germans; The Germanic Rune Row and
the ~~mn10n Germanic Language; The English Runic Tradition; The Scandinavian Runic
Trad1t1on; Runes and Pseudo-runes; The Use of Runes ; Bind Runes and Runic Cryptography.
5.95 Illustrations
Woden's Warriors
Paul Mortimer
Regia Anglorum
This book explores some of the resources available to warriors in Anglo-Saxon England and
1
1
northern. Europe du.ring. t!1e 6 h and 7 ~ centuries. In this time of great change, the remains of
old empires were still. v1s1b~e but new 1~eas and methods of organisation were making possible
the growth of centralised kingdoms which became the nation states that dominated Europe for
the next thousand years.
It was also a time of great artistry and wealth, much of which was devoted to the creation of
works of art devote~ to _war ~d warfare. rt is a time when traditional symbols of identity and
the old gods were mmglmg with new patterns of belief.
This book provides the reader with glimpses of what it was like to be part of a warrior society.
Over 300 illustrations
45 305 illustrations large format hardback 304 pages
7th
century
Stephen Pollington
Not o?ly was there considerable artistry in the output of early Anglo-Saxon workshops, but it
was vigorous, complex and technically challenging.
T.he designs found o~ Anglo-Saxon artefacts are never mere ornament: in a society which used
visual and verbal signals to demonstrate power, authority, status and ethnicity, no visual
statement was ever empty of meaning.
Th~ aim of this ~ork is .to p'.omp~ a better understanding of Anglo-Saxon art and the society
which produced 1t. Nothmg hke this has been published for nearly J00 years.
70 548 pages 62 colour plates, 226 illustrations
Anglo-Saxon Books
Order online at www.asbooks.co.uk
Check website for changes in prices and availability
Wuffing Education
Wuffing Education provides those interested in the history, archaeology, literature and culture
of the Anglo-Saxons with the chance to meet experts and fellow enthusiasts for a whole day of
in-depth seminars and discussions. Day Schools take place at the historic Tranmer House
overlooking the burial mounds of Sutton Hoo in Suffolk. For details events go to website www.wuffings.co.uk email education@wuffings.co.uk
Places to visit
Bede's World
at Jarrow
Bede' s world tells the remarkable story of the life and times of the Venerable Bede, 673- 735
AD. Visitors can explore the origins of early medieval Northumbria and Bede' s life and
achievements through his own writings and the excavations of the monasteries at Jarrow and
other sites.
Location - 10 miles from Newcastle upon Tyne, off the A 19 near the southern entrance to the
River Tyne twmel. Bus services 526 & 527
Bede's World, Church Bank, Jarrow, Tyne and Wear, NE32 3DY
Tel. 01914892106; Fax: 01914282361 ; website: www.bedesworld.co.uk
Sutton Hoo